Gold Coast Cruise Ship Terminal

May 14, 2018

This one letter demolishes Cruise Ship Terminal (CST) attempt #14

Carnival Cruise Company are investing $158m of their own money into a dedicated Brisbane CST home port. Carnival constitute over 95% of crusise ship docking in SEQ - they are not interested in the Gold Coast.

In addition to over $1m of ratepayer funds already spent on CST Feasibility studies GCCC are intending to waste $12.5m more of ratepayers funds on further crusie ship terminal "studies".

Cruise ships using the Gold Coast's proposed $450 million oceanside terminal could "be pushed to shore" by strong winds and waves, according to a section of an official report which has been withheld from the public.

UN-REDACTED ..... What they don't want you to know about the oceanside cruise ship terminal proposal at Philip Park on the Gold Coast Spit.

The GCCC refuse to release an un-redacted version of the 'Oceanside Cruise Ship Terminal (OCST) feasibility study for Philip Park' and therefore any support for it is based on false and misleading information and unsubstantiated motherhood statements. As a small sample, the un-redacted report contains the following:

1. The GCCC Report states that it is "unlikely private investors will be interested" in the OCST at Philip Park because of its "Nett Operating loss of $40-150 million over 30 years."

2. The GCCC report suggests that the GCCC "may need to invest capital of $530m from its $700m in cash reserves" to construct the CST and this will require the "diversion of funds from other GCCC programs."

3. The un-redacted study reveals that only 61 casual jobs will be created by the proposed OCST at Philip Park equating to 41 FTE jobs but only on "days that ships visit." No ships, no jobs.

4. The OCST at Philip Park needs to be a Home (Base) Port even to run at a $40m-$150m operating loss over 30 years because a transit port (only visiting ships) is not economically viable. A Home Port requires on-land warehousing and cold storage facilities on The Spit for provisioning ships. These facilities have not been designated in the GCCC terminal drawings nor have the necessary forklift and truck tarmacs. The costs and impacts on existing park and tourism assets and activities have not been included in the feasibility study.

5. Australian and International marine safety authorities have made it mandatory for tug boat/pilot services to be available full-time at commercial and cruise ports. No Broadwater foreshores have been designated for a tug base nor has land on The Spit been allocated for the necessary land-based infrastructure for tug services. The inclusion of a tug fleet has a huge impact on potential locations for the trawler fleet, super-yacht berthing, boutique cruise docking sites etc. and public access to the Broadwater, western Spit and foreshores. The costs of buying and hosting tug/pilot services has not been included the OCST port operating costs/losses.

6. Home Ports require the offload of sewage, offload of hard and soft waste and the loading of freshwater to the ship. None of these hard infrastructure components (pipes, truck areas etc) have been included in the 'drawings' of the Philip Park 'Terminal' facilities in the information provided by GCCC.

7. The feasibility study recognizes that no provision for fuel bunkers can be provided on The Spit and so fuel barges will need to pass through Moreton Bay Marine Park from the Port of Brisbane or a re-fuel barge being permanently docked at the Oceanside jetty off Philip Park. (GCCC Officers 22/06/18) The study has no costing for the provision of fuel in the projected port operating costs.

8. All the income, BCR and other economic benefits cited in the feasibility study are based on 212 ship 'visits' (sic) to the Gold Coast per annum. This is a fictitious figure. It is the figure of 'ship movements' that the new mega-cruise ship terminal in the Port of Brisbane will achieve by 2025 with Carnival Cruises using Brisbane as their Home (base) Port for their Pacific cruise itineraries. The 212 figure also includes a small number of Royal Caribbean and transit visit cruise vessels. For the GCCC proposal to suggest they will match the Port of Brisbane figures of 212 vessels per year is pure fantasy.

9. The highly exaggerated Benefit Cost Ratio (BCR) of 3.0 – 3.9 or an output $2.6 - $3.1 billion over 30 years which is supposedly based on "passenger and crew spend", does not take into account points 4 – 7.

10. A Home Port must be able to guarantee safe docking of ships 365 days a year at all times of the day and night. Given the meteorological and ocean conditions of the Gold Coast, the Philip Park OCST proposal can never guarantee those safe docking parameters, making further mockery of the 212 visits (sic) per annum suggested in the feasibility study.

11. No navigational safety simulations were conducted to test the safe entry of vessels to the jetty area or for the safe ‘swinging of those vessels to the jetty berth or the departures of vessels. The only tests conducted were on the mooring line stresses once the vessels were docked, not whether the vessels could actually safely dock in the range of weather and ocean conditions encountered on the Gold Coast.

12. The environmental damage to Spit beaches has not been costed or addressed in relation to the on-land infrastructure needed to provide beach nourishment, backflow sand or set up a new sand-pumping facility at the site of the proposed OCST to counter the "wave shadow" i.e. interruption to the northerly littoral transport of sediment (sand) along Spit beaches. The feasibility study suggests this may sort itself out 'naturally' over a period of years with no engineering report or technical data to support this contention. What is a fact is that Spit beaches bring in excess of $15m per annum (Lazarow – GCCC shoreline management plan) from recreational surfing activities i.e. just by leaving the Spit beaches in their natural state.

13. The GCCC submission to the Commonwealth Government on the Philip Park OCST under the Federal EPBC Act, claimed there was little of environmental significance at Philip Park after conducting a single "4 hour land-based survey" on one day in the year. It is has since been revealed by an independent survey and confirmed by a GCB article in Feb 2018 that protected turtle nesting sites exist near Philip Park Beach and at other locations along The Spit beaches. This fact alone should halt any OCST proposal anywhere on The Spit including Philip Park let alone the potential disruption to the annual whale migratory paths and prop strike.

14. The 'feasibility study' reveals a totally inadequate 'swing basin' diameter for the ships to 'swing' into and out of the jetty berths. Maritime Safety authorities will reject the formula used by the study to come to the conclusion that a 450 metre diameter swing basin for the Philip Park OCST is acceptable. The appropriate PIANC guidelines suggest that a 610 -720 metre swing basin is required (depending on vessel length – LOA) and that would put ‘swinging' cruise vessels directly over the heritage-listed and Federally protected dive wreck, The Scottish Prince.

There are many more 'facts' the GCCC has redacted from the publicly available version of the "OCST feasibility study for Philip Park" that will be revealed in good time.

Once again we refer you to the Tourism Australia 2020 report clearly indicating that over 13,000 international tourists regard Australian Beaches, Wildlife and National Parks as the most appealing attractions when visiting Australia.